[VAC] Re: Control Panel Ammeter

["Weimers" <mweimer@xxxxxxxx>]

Inspired by your post,  I attempted this reattachment surgery this
afternoon.  I attached one wire to the power converter and the other wire to
the battery (directly).  I have about 18 inches of 10 gauge wire from the
converter to the battery. The ammeter leads are attached to either end of
this wire. Essentially, the ammeter measures the line loss in this piece of
10 gauge wire.  Actually, the "Ammeter" in the control panel (on my '71 GT,
anyway) is not really an ammeter at all.  The "ammeter" is actually a
millivolt meter, from what I can tell.

Did it work?   Well, sort of.    The meter has units that go from +50 to -50
amps.  Well, the meter only registered about 5 "amps" when I had all the
lights switched on (plus a fan and the water pump). In other words, it
hardly moved. Unfortunately, a snow storm moved in and the temperature was
about 25 degrees out there, so I quit.  It might work if I get a longer wire
from the converter to the battery and hook up the "ammeter" across it.

I have a couple of other ideas to try out too when the weather gets a little
better.  I'm no electrical engineer!

With all the lights on, I took a good digital volt meter and got 90 mV
across the 10 gauge wire ( from the converter to the battery).  It looks
like I'll have to use several feet of wire get the voltage drop I need to
get the "ammeter" to work properly.

Incidentally,  Punxsutawney Phil the groundhog was right when he predicted
six more weeks of winter ...so ALL RIGHT ALREADY ....the six weeks is up!!!

MARC WEIMER
Punxsutawney, PA  -  Home of the Groundhog
#15767
1963 Globe Trotter
1971 Globe Trotter
http://users.penn.com/~mweimer/weimer.html